No matter how much you hear about spread offenses and space-age passing
games, many coaches boil down winning to one thing: Running the
football.

Running accomplishes a lot of things. It helps a team control the
clock. It puts an offense in safer down-and-distance situations. It
allows the defense to rest.

Who would you say are a couple of the nation's most surprising teams at
this point? Certainly Rutgers owes its 7-0 start to the ground game.
How about Boise State and its 8-0 start? The Broncos are in the top 10
in the country in rushing. So are unexpected top 25 teams Arkansas and
Texas A&M.

With that said, we ran through the NCAA statistics and ground out this
information for you:

.847

Winning percentage of teams in the top 10 in the NCAA in
rushing offense, including four undefeated teams and no teams with
losing records (61-11)

.613

Winning
percentage of teams in the top 10 in the NCAA in passing offense,
including two teams with losing records (46-29)

Rutgers RB Ray Rice.

Wisconsin RB P.J. Hill.

22

Division I-A teams, including No. 11 Notre Dame, that
don't have as many rushing yards the entire season as Wisconsin
redshirt freshman running back P.J. Hill has in his past four
games (714)